The Dreaded Fifth Period Returns

Wednesday, fifth period—17:00 to 19:00.

The dreaded hour of Professor Sadako's lecture had returned.

Inside the classroom for Adventurer's Night Operations stood an imposing stone wall that looked cursed at a glance, with a massive coffin propped up against its face.

Crack. Crackle.

Her long black hair draped down to veil her face, Professor Sadako uttered the eerie, bone-chilling laughter that never failed to raise goosebumps. She greeted Titocoga and Zhuang as the pair crept hesitantly into the room.

"Welcome……."

"W-Where is Orknodi?"

"Right here!"

"Eeeek! Why are you jumping out of a coffin?!"

"Just felt like scaring you?"

To be exact, I had arrived early and hunkered down in the dark for three full minutes purely to grind these stats. When I asked permission to hide in the coffin beforehand, the professor had stared at me with an expression that practically screamed, Oh my, necromancer potential? It weighed on my mind a little, but surely it would be fine. After all, Professor Sadako never took on disciples!

"Excuse me, Professor Sadako. I've been wondering since we walked in," Zhuang spoke up, eyeing the back of the room. "Why is that massive stone wall erected back there? It wasn't here during our last lecture."

"For today's lesson, I requisitioned terrain constructed by the third-years during their practical training."

"Third-year seniors? That gives me nothing but bad vibes."

Zhuang had already witnessed firsthand what courses involving upperclassmen were like during our Ranged Weapon Mastery class. Even during the throwing dagger trials she participated in, the juniors taking Jenegger's Tactics had set up a betting pool. I didn't know how that wager had turned out, but after being treated like racehorses on a track by third-year gamblers, it was only natural for her to worry about what horrors awaited inside terrain designed for first-years.

"Impressive that you've already figured it out after just three days of enrollment," Professor Sadako murmured softly. "The third-years are all utter trash."

"Professor, then why is that coffin propped up against it?"

"I brought it so I could release the corpses resting inside into the maze."

"……."

"The living dead. Unholy kin of the night. It is a field prowled by the unrotting."

Crack. Creak.

Professor Sadako chuckled, making that dreadful snapping sound that made one fear what sort of grin lay hidden beneath the curtain of hair.

"I-I'd like to drop this course……" Titocoga stammered, so thoroughly spooked that her knees rattled together. Clutching her light stand, the trembling girl looked downright pitiful.

"A shame," the professor drawled. "Simply entering and stepping back out awards a flat ten percent on your practical evaluation."

"Ten percent?!"

"Furthermore, reaching the exit through your own strength within the thirty-minute time limit yields a maximum escape reward of five hundred points."

"Five hundred points?!"

"For faint-hearted students, I was even prepared to permit carrying a personal light source, but if you truly decline, so be it."

"I'll go first!"

Perhaps having realized the sheer supremacy of academy points, Titocoga shot her hand into the air with burning determination.

"Be my guest."

"Whatever makes you happy, Titocoga!"

Zhuang and I waved her off with encouraging smiles. Titocoga took a resolute breath and stepped past the entrance. With the low grinding noise of her light stand scraping the flagstones, we stood listening, imagining the timid girl creeping through the dark.

A few moments later, an ear-splitting shriek ripped through the chamber.

"Eeeeeeeek!"

"……Is she dead? That sounded lethal," Zhuang muttered, terrified enough to betray her assassin training as she nervously rubbed the goosebumps on her forearms.

"Stay back! Don't come near me! Don't touch meeeee! Aaaaaaaagh!"

The pitch climbed higher and higher, piercing the gloom. With a tightened diaphragm, relaxed throat, and constricted vocal cords, she produced a sound worthy of a virtuoso soprano. A three-tier high note soared effortlessly from B5 to D6 and peaked at a dizzying C7, echoing deep ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠beyond the stone maze before cutting off abruptly into silence.

"I'm going home."

Grades, credits, and points be damned; Zhuang's will to participate had evaporated entirely. Discarding any pretense of wicked assassin pride, she stood drooping like a hound dragged to the slaughterhouse.

"Time over," Professor Sadako announced. Grasping an orb lightly in her hand, she projected her will, causing the sphere to radiate a faint, ominous dark light.

A moment later, unholy figures emerged with disjointed, jerky strides. Well-preserved, pallid zombies marched out in lockstep, carrying Titocoga and her light stand between them like orderlies wheeling a patient on an IV drip.

"Grandpa…… save me……"

Coldly ignoring the girl babbling in her faint, Sadako turned her gaze back toward us. "Now then. Who wishes to enter next?"

"I'll take a crack at it!"

It looked terrifying from the outside, but once you built up enough experience, ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠practical exams like this were hardly threatening.

"Very well…… What difficulty do you desire?"

"Maximum difficulty, please!"

Sadako offered a pleased smile and pulled the lever affixed to the coffin on the wall all the way to its ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠limit.

Rumble-crash-clatter-thud!

Like soda cans dropping from a vending machine after hitting the button, a horde of corpses tumbled through the adjoining chute and spilled out behind the stone barrier.

"Enter."

"Okey-dokey."

"O-Orknodi?! Are you insane?!"

Leaving behind Zhuang's frantic, screeching send-off, I slipped past the entrance of the stone wall. The interior was pitch-black. From every direction came the senseless, guttural groans of the restless dead—Urrgh…… Grrrhh……

I couldn't see an inch ahead of me, but dropping to my knees and crawling low across the stone floor gave me all the information I needed. Five meters ahead, one zombie. At the upcoming intersection, judging by the muffled scraping to the right, another lurked behind the dead-end partition.

All in all, this class was total free real estate!

Compared to sweating bullets against overpowered cheaters in Ranged Weapon Mastery, this task felt tailored to my strengths. Minimal effort, massive returns. Truly, low-effort high-reward practical assignments are the absolute best thing in the world!

"Was it... actually manageable?" Zhuang asked cautiously.

"Yep. Total walk in the park."

"……Alright. In that case, I'll give it a shot too." Zhuang swallowed hard, stepping toward the stone aperture on trembling legs.

"Enter," Sadako commanded.

"Professor? Aren't you going to ask what difficulty I want?"

"There is no need to ask."

"You don't harbor some narrow-minded prejudice that assassins obviously have to tackle maximum difficulty, do you?"

"I hold no such prejudice," Professor Sadako answered smoothly, unfazed by the casual insolence in the girl's tone. "Once dead, mere humans are all trivial beings destined to degrade into cold corpses…… Classes, aptitudes, worldly matters in life—none of it matters in death."

Crack.

At the familiar sound of her joint-snapping laugh, Zhuang squeezed her thighs together in sheer panic. Claiming she held no prejudices because everyone ended up as rotting meat anyway was way too terrifying!

"Isn't a healthy dose of discrimination a fundamental virtue required for human warmth?!" Zhuang blurted.

"Are you done babbling?"

"……Can I go to the bathroom for a second?"

"You had ample time to visit the lavatory before class. Hurry inside. Everyone is waiting for you."

"W-Wait! What about the difficulty setting? You haven't adjusted it yet!"

If she could just lower the difficulty, it might be survivable. But Professor Sadako crushed that fragile hope without mercy.

"Resetting the lever does not force the corpses back into their coffin. Once raised, difficulty cannot be lowered."

"……Orknodiiiiii!"

"Hey, I gave you the chance to go first!"

In the end, Zhuang had no choice but to step into the stone maze on maximum difficulty.

Five minutes later, she burst out of the exit wailing at the top of her lungs, having butchered eight zombies along the way.

"That was horrifying!"

"Hyaaaa! You running at me covered in blood is way more horrifying!"

Titocoga, who had just regained consciousness, shrieked in terror at the sight of Zhuang drenched from head to toe in blackish undead gore.

"It appears you enjoyed yourself thoroughly," Sadako remarked calmly.

"You wicked professor! I didn't enjoy it in the slightest!"

"The children spoke to me as well," Sadako murmured, tilting her head. "They said it had been far too long since they shared breath in cramped quarters with someone possessing young, vibrant skin, and that it left them wonderfully refreshed……"

"……Gross."

"They asked me to pass along a message: next time, they will be certain to kill you and feast upon your entrails, so please look after your health until then."

Right then and there, Zhuang swore a silent oath: starting next week, she was cutting this godforsaken class forever.

"……U-Um, Professor…… What was the point of this assignment in the end? All I remember is screaming until I passed out……"

Fear was a marvelous teacher of manners. Titocoga, who had previously matched Zhuang's informal speech beat for beat, now inquired with utmost politeness and a thoroughly paralyzed face.

Faced with Titocoga's aggrieved query, Professor Sadako answered as though stating the obvious.

"Did you not learn about an adventurer's night operations?"

"All we did was walk into a stone maze crawling with zombies!"

"And under the visceral dread that capture meant death, you naturally learned how to survive in the dark."

Titocoga's jaw dropped, flapping wordlessly like a landed fish. Sadako reached out and patted her trembling shoulder with a hand as cold as frost.

"Fret not…… You are only first-years. I will not lock you in a coffin for two days or bury you alive in a cemetery to raise your dark affinity just because you failed a practical test."

"Do second-years get subjected to such atrocities?!"

Professor Sadako offered no reply. Truth be told, even I found that a little unnerving. Then again, if you just perform well, you won't get locked in a coffin, right?

"I spent three minutes in a coffin earlier and it wasn't a big deal at all!" I piped up.

"How on earth is that comparable to two whole days?! What kind of upbringing did you have to say that with such a cheerful smile on your face?!" Zhuang stared at me with an expression of sheer disgust, which said a lot coming from a hardened assassin.

Why was she looking at me like that? If you're scared, just don't fail ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the assignment.

"Class is dismissed. Aren't you glad you skipped dinner beforehand?"

Glancing between the dazed pair and my comparatively unblemished, rosy complexion, Professor Sadako nodded in quiet satisfaction. "I am well aware. The assignment was far too trivial for your capabilities."

"I'm perfectly fine with the current level, though!"

"No. A proper lecture must be tailored to the individual caliber of the student."

"I'd really appreciate it if you tailored it to the bottom-tier students instead," Titocoga mumbled under her breath, though Sadako paid her not the slightest heed.

"You may look forward to it," the professor whispered, a chill settling over the room. "After next week's lecture, you will possess absolute confidence in your nocturnal maneuvers."

A sudden, distinct premonition struck me.

Come next week, I had a feeling I was going to be the only student left in this classroom!