Fraudulent Admission
"Siyul. How about letting me in on that little 'ability' of yours? Just between us?"
"Excuse me……?"
I blurted out something stupid at the sudden direct pitch. Chloe merely offered a charming, eye-smiling look and began listing the sweet conditions one after another.
"In return, there's plenty I can do for you. Solid connections in a major guild, overflowing BP, all sorts of high-grade intel. Or, if none of that tempts you…… I could even arrange the requirements for graduation somehow?"
Graduation!
My ears perked right up at the word.
Just moments ago I'd been trembling at the miserable future of being burned at the stake as a bread-thief villain, so the temptation landed like the devil's own whisper—sweet and irresistible.
I swallowed hard, dry throat working, ready to take the bait—
Bam—!
Anastasia, sitting beside me, slammed her palm down on the table hard enough to rattle everything.
"Hey. What the hell are you doing? This bitch is already starting shit on the academy's first day."
She glared at Chloe with a razor-sharp stare.
Chloe, completely unfazed, gave a leisurely little shrug.
"What? I was just making a friendly offer."
"Friendly offer my ass. You're just itching to suck him dry for everything he's worth."
Anastasia clicked her tongue, then whipped her glare onto me and laid down the law.
"Hey. Don't listen to a single word this bitch says. Not even with one ear."
Caught between the two women's crackling standoff, I broke out in cold sweat and just sat there reading the room. Chloe finally let out a light laugh and was the first to look away.
"Well, I'm not asking for an answer right this second. Take your time thinking it over."
She rose from her seat with elegant ease and added,
"Still, you know, Siyul. Even if you never tell me, I can already make a few educated guesses."
"……Huh?"
"Looking at that ominous, spine-chilling aura you showed off at the welcome tournament earlier…… I'm thinking it's some kind of 'curse-type shamanic ability.' Am I right?"
Curse-type shamanism?
Hang on—thinking it over carefully, it wasn't entirely wrong.
My trash ability required me to wound my own body to activate, or to take the damage in someone else's place.
So you could call it a curse that offered myself up as the sacrifice, couldn't you?
……Is that it? Now that she says it, it kind of makes sense.
I must have worn a strangely thoughtful expression while seriously accepting the idea, because Chloe, watching my face, let a confident smile bloom at the corner of her mouth.
"I'll find out eventually either way. There are plenty of methods. So don't keep me hanging too long—I'll be waiting for a quick answer, okay~?"
Chloe gave a light little wave.
Johnson, who had already cleaned his tray in silence, stood and followed after her without a word.
"Well then, bye-bye~"
I stared blankly, blinking, at the two retreating backs after their casual farewell.
Then Anastasia, still seated beside me, warned me in a low, heavy voice.
"Don't ever tell her."
She kept her cold eyes fixed on the direction Chloe had vanished and continued.
"That bitch only sees you as a political tool. The second you're no longer useful, she'll toss you aside without a second thought."
At that chilling warning I suddenly turned my head and looked at Anastasia.
She had been batting Chloe away this whole time, almost as if protecting me.
Without thinking, I asked the question that just popped out.
"……Then, unnie, you wouldn't do that?"
"……What?"
My straight shot made Anastasia's shoulders flinch and stiffen.
She couldn't even look at me; her gaze skittered off into empty air, and her lips trembled as she stammered.
"Me……? I…… well, yeah……. Of course……."
For once the usual unstoppable grizzly-bear woman looked thoroughly flustered.
That strange atmosphere hung between us for a beat—
Ding-dong-dang-dong—!
The bell announcing the start of afternoon classes rang through the massive cafeteria.
At the sound Anastasia shot to her feet.
"G-get up already! We have to go too!"
Without waiting for my answer she hurried toward the cafeteria exit as if fleeing.
I scrambled up after her, eyes lingering on the backs of Chloe and Johnson, who were already heading out the doors ahead of us.
Was it just my imagination that Chloe's receding figure felt especially unfamiliar?
I stood rooted in place, unable to look away until that silhouette had completely vanished into the crowd.
…….
A cold wind seemed to whistle through a corner of my chest.
Apparently I had been more excited than I realized at the simple fact of sitting face-to-face with someone, sharing a meal and trading jokes for the first time.
In silence I began trailing after Anastasia's broad, reliable back as she walked ahead.
After returning our empty trays we headed for the First Main Building's grand auditorium—the same place where the morning entrance ceremony had been held.
The moment Anastasia and I took our seats side by side in that same out-of-the-way corner where we had first met, the exhaustion from rolling around all morning crashed over me like a tidal wave.
I kneaded my stiff neck and asked in a limp voice,
"Unnie…… what's next? I'm already…… kind of worn out……."
My whining made Anastasia scrunch her brow and snap back,
"Look at the damn schedule yourself. Don't ask me. You're getting on my nerves for real."
Even while talking so roughly, she slipped her phone out of her pocket, glanced at it, and added gruffly,
"……Still got some high-ups coming out to spout the usual bullshit. After that, today's schedule is done."
"Really……? At least that's a relief……."
A little later the lights in the murmuring auditorium dimmed and a spotlight dropped onto the stage.
This time it wasn't Chancellor Oh Yura; a middle-aged man in a neat suit stepped up to the microphone.
"Welcome, new students. I am James Bond, vice-chancellor of Babel Academy."
James Bond?
It was a name that made me want to play a killer round of the drinking game "007 Bread" with him as the snack.
Swallowing the silly joke, I tried to pay attention to his speech.
But the vice-chancellor turned out to be a human sleeping pill on par with the chancellor herself.
With the background murmur as soundtrack, I managed to listen halfway through another round of boring talk about humanity's shield this and that—then the flood of drowsiness finally won and I blacked out as if my consciousness had simply shut off.
……
…………
Thwack!
A small impact against my forehead snapped my eyes open.
"Ow……."
I rubbed the stinging spot and groaned. Anastasia glared at me from the side like I was hopeless.
"It's over, you dumbass. Get up already."
Still half-dreaming, I lifted my head and realized the place I had been using as a pillow was none other than Anastasia's shoulder.
Holy shit, I fell asleep on the grizzly-bear woman's shoulder?! I'm lucky I'm not dead!
I hurriedly peeled myself away and looked around.
The once-packed grand auditorium was already empty; almost every other student had left.
Embarrassed, I casually wiped the corner of my mouth and pretended nothing had happened.
"Mmh…… so, was there anything important?"
"……No."
A curt reply.
Surprising. Normally she was the type who would have kicked the stage for how long the speech dragged on, yet she hadn't dozed off herself and had simply offered her shoulder the whole time until I woke up.
Even though I had completely checked out halfway through, luckily the parts of the vice-chancellor's explanation about the academy's class system that I had heard before the film cut still lingered hazily in my head.
Piecing together what I remembered, the system went roughly like this.
Academy classes were split into "common required courses" that every cadet had to take, and "major courses" that only students of the same department took together.
And unaffiliated students like me, who belonged to no department, were forced to take "department introduction courses" instead of majors.
Looking at the timetable structure, mornings were for common required classes; afternoons everyone scattered to their major classes.
This is basically no different from high school.
Department students seemed to have some choice within their major classes, but as an unaffiliated student I was stuck taking the intro courses by force.
It was a structure that truly differed not one bit from high school.
I had secretly looked forward to a romantic university campus life, yet the reality was barely any different from high school—the disappointment was crushing.
If it was going to be like this, they should just call the chancellor a principal and the professors teachers.
And even worse than the class system was the first-semester academic schedule.
There were so many evaluations that at shortest every week, and at longest every three weeks, practical or written tests were jammed tightly into the schedule.
There was even one evaluation already set for next week.
It was some gate-related practical evaluation, though they claimed it didn't open a real dangerous gate—just used some artifact to open a virtual space, so it was supposedly safe…… or something like that.
Anyway, it was virtual this-and-that, but with my current level of common sense I had no idea exactly what it involved.
Haa…… how am I supposed to survive this brutal schedule…….
I was letting out a heavy sigh, painting a bleak future in my mind, when Anastasia roughly stood up and said to me,
"What are you doing? Aren't you getting up? You said you'd buy me coffee."
"Ah! Right……!"
I had completely forgotten the coffee promise. I bounced up from the seat like popcorn.
And just as I confidently tried to take the lead, a very fundamental problem suddenly hit me.
I awkwardly scratched the back of my head and asked,
"……But, uh, do you know where the café is?"
At my dumb question Anastasia let out a deep sigh.
"Aigoo, the guy who said he'd treat doesn't even know the location?"
She irritably ruffled her hair, then pulled out her phone and quickly searched something.
A moment later she thrust the screen right in front of my eyes.
"Here. How about this place?"
The map app showed a stylish-looking café not far from the academy.
I nodded with a bright smile.
"Sounds good! Let's go, unnie!"
With light steps I left the grand auditorium together with her.