6. Tradition, Corruption, Malpractice, Custom
6. Tradition, Corruption, Malpractice, Custom
"Aaaargh!!!"
Crunch! Crack!
Noise and howls erupted from the room. The exclusive dormitory blocked sound from reaching neighboring floors, so there was no risk of a duel breaking out over the racket, but the once-tidy room had been reduced to chaos.
At its center, amid the wreckage.
The room's owner, Chloe Pisti, gasped for breath.
"How... how...!"
Her tied-up hair had come loose and hung in disarray, her eyes were bloodshot, and her hands were covered in scratches and wounds.
Still clenching her fists hard enough for her nails to gouge her palms, Chloe glared with blood-rimmed eyes and spat through her teeth.
"How?!"
Chloe Pisti had won the duel. She had faced Beatrice twice and won both times.
And yet, paradoxically.
Chloe had not won. At least, that was what she herself believed.
"Hah... haah..."
The magic Beatrice had displayed in their second duel was not the sort of thing a half-wit who couldn't even use magic properly due to a chronic illness could simply watch and copy on the spot. How much effort had Chloe herself poured into imbuing [Fireball] with multiple attributes?
People called Chloe a genius. Chloe herself preened at being the only genius worthy of becoming the Archmage's disciple.
It was a lie.
Chloe might be a talent. She was never a genius.
If anyone was the real genius...
"No!"
Smash!
The moment Beatrice's face surfaced in her mind, Chloe drove her bleeding fist into the already half-destroyed desk.
A 5th Rank mage who wasn't actively wielding mana wasn't so different from an ordinary person. Chloe's fist split open further, spilling more blood.
Had the excitement numbed her to the pain? No. Even now, Chloe felt every vivid spike of agony searing through her brain.
Facing the pain head-on was a choice.
A way to sear it into memory.
"Beatrice..."
I will never lose. Not to you.
Born nothing but a slave's child, how many hardships had she endured to become the Archmage's disciple? A position she had clawed toward for so long. A place earned through relentless effort, every single day.
Yet Beatrice threatened that place with nothing but raw genius. Stealing the attention of her revered master.
──If your talent had only been on that child's level...
Words Chloe had once, entirely by accident, overheard from her master.
From that day on, Chloe had burned with fury at Beatrice. When her magic misfired at the entrance ceremony, Chloe felt like she was losing her mind, certain Beatrice was showing her up on purpose.
So she had picked the fight. She had confirmed the chronic illness she'd only heard rumors about. Only then had Chloe been able to relax. With that illness, no matter how much of a genius Beatrice was, it wouldn't matter.
But in their second duel, Beatrice had overcome her chronic illness as if to flaunt it.
Why? Because you're a genius? Because you have the talent my master acknowledged?
"..."
Standing in the wreckage of her room, Chloe stared down at her bloodied hands and wrestled with a question that had no answer.
"Something must have happened."
Beatrice's chronic illness had shown no sign of improving. Yet she had somehow found a way to surmount it, however imperfectly, in a single week.
The Delphia Kingdom had once tried to resolve it on a national scale and failed. If Beatrice could have overcome it on her own, she would have done so long ago.
Something existed. Something—or someone—who had influenced Beatrice during that one week.
"Let's go."
With a grim glint in her eyes, Chloe resolved to investigate Beatrice. And after that, she would do what she always did—what any mere talent like Chloe Pisti had to do to keep her place as the Archmage's disciple.
As always.
It was time to practice. Time to grind.
*
I got off work.
With the artifact the King had granted me, I'd resolved this month's expense problem and set a major worry to rest, and by luck, the workload itself had been light today, so I was able to leave early.
I'd meant for us to leave together, but of all days, Laura had to work late tonight, so I'd had no choice but to head out alone.
'10 p.m. already.'
That was much earlier than usual. Surely I'd earned a little leisure.
Having decided that, I turned toward the market street instead of heading straight for the dormitory.
I'd learned a few things during the year I spent doing manual labor after first being pulled into this game. Magic might exist and multiple fields of study might be advanced, but the age of Dark Kingdom was still fundamentally medieval.
When the sun set, the workday ended. Fireplaces and candles existed, and so did mana lamps, but outside of a lord's castle, they were too expensive to be seen in ordinary territory.
Grandis Academy was a different story.
True to our Chairwoman's character, she'd thrown money at every corner when building the place.
"There's a famous late-night place that way!"
"It really is cheaper if you buy at night. Should I keep shopping this late...?"
"Babe! Let's go!"
Nightfall didn't plunge the academy into darkness. Instead, the mana lamps installed everywhere lit up, crafting a unique nightscape.
There was a saying in the Kingdom: at night, only two places remain bright—the Royal Castle and Grandis Academy.
Honestly, every time I saw them, I wanted to strip all those mana lamps and sell them off, but Grandis Academy's night view and night market had long since become famous landmarks. Touching them was out of the question.
Anyway.
Students with the next day off, merchants slashing prices to clear inventory, couples enjoying nighttime dates—crowds filled the night streets.
I walked quietly among them.
'I used to hang out here a lot as a student.'
Thanks to that, I knew the night market's layout inside and out. I'd come often with Laura and that damn junior of mine. To be precise, I'd been dragged along.
Back then, I'd really hated it, but looking back now, it was all nostalgia.
I drifted through the night market, steeped in pointless reminiscence, until I soon reached my intended shop.
Elijah's General Store
"All right."
Ever since I'd become Finance Director, I'd started toward this place several times but always ended up turning back.
Now I steeled myself and stepped inside.
"Thank you, come again!"
"Good business to you."
The thing I'd had my eye on all this time but never managed to buy.
In the end, I splurged.
'I want to use it right away.'
Normally, I wouldn't have the money for something like this. I did draw a salary, but aside from the bare minimum living expenses, every coin went back into the academy's finances.
But today, hadn't I received something a little different?
A gesture directed not at the Finance Director, but at "Adam."
That was as good as the excuse Beatrice had handed me.
Did I not have my own desires for money? When Beatrice had said that and passed me the box filled with precious metals and gold, greed had welled up inside me along with another thought.
──With this, maybe I could afford a little luxury.
And I'd been unable to shake off that temptation. I'd shut my eyes tight and sold my conscience.
I was walking through the night streets, feeling the weight of the "item" in my hand while a strange sense of guilt gnawed at me, when—
"Oh? Finance Director?"
"Hm? Ah, Lady Risha."
"Last time we met, my enrollment hadn't been finalized, but now I am a student of Grandis Academy. Please feel free to call me Student Risha."
"Then I'll take the liberty. Student Risha."
"Yes."
In aristocratic phrasing, that probably meant she wanted us to drop the formalities. By noble subtext, we'd already exchanged bribes, so she was signaling we could be a little more familiar.
As a bonus, Risha and the Claudia family would still think of me as a fool they could use—someone who'd take bribes through the Finance Director's seat.
If I acted appropriately chummy, they'd figure I was playing right into their hands. Sure—given my age and career, I probably looked less like a senior academy official and more like a green kid who didn't know any better.
"I received the fruit you sent last time. Firm and full of juice—it was excellent."
"Was it? I'm glad."
"I'd like to ask for more from time to time."
"Fruit is a specialty of the Claudia territory, after all. If the Finance Director wishes it, we can send as much as you like."
It was true that fruit was a local product, and true that I'd received a box of fruit. The contents, naturally, had been different.
When I'd looked into it a little, the middlemen had been swapped out several times using a fruit vendor from the territory, thoroughly laundered. No surprise there—a great noble house would know its way around delivering a bribe.
We exchanged formal smiles and walked together for a short while before Risha's gaze drifted to the "item" I'd bought.
"Finance Director? In your hand—is that a fountain pen?"
"You've got a sharp eye. I finally worked up the nerve to buy one."
The things I handled most as Finance Director were paperwork and pens. The problem was, in the course of signing documents and taking notes all day, pens kept breaking or wearing out, which had become a real nuisance since last year.
Pens were academy supplies, so I could just request new ones, but what I'd always wanted was a sturdy, well-balanced fountain pen I wouldn't need to replace.
'Though it wasn't strictly necessary, so I never bought one.'
Beatrice's encouragement had broken my self-control. I couldn't believe I'd bought something so expensive.
Risha's expression, however, was oddly careful as she looked at the pen.
"But that one is the cheapest model—most students won't even use... Forgive me. I spoke out of turn."
"What's there to forgive? It's the truth."
When I'd dipped into Beatrice's bribe box, I'd only taken a single gold coin, so this was the best I could manage. The rest of the precious metals and gold? Obviously, those all went straight into the academy's accounts.
Sure, it was embezzlement, strictly speaking, but my post as Finance Director not only made it possible—it also made it impossible for anyone else to know.
Was this what they meant by great power carrying great responsibility?
'Feels like... the responsibility might be running a little heavier than I thought.'
To be honest, even a more expensive fountain pen would just have fancier looks and ornamentation. It wouldn't write much differently from this one. It wasn't so much that I was frugal as that a long tenure in the Finance Department had taught me to be efficient in my luxuries, too.
Now that I thought about it, this was the first luxury I'd allowed myself since taking the Finance Director's seat. Maybe I could call it a gift to my first-year-professional self.
Still, while I was fine with my choice, Risha seemed to be agonizing over her blunder, so I spoke up first.
I'd noticed it last time we met—for someone who handled a spear, she was surprisingly clumsy at this sort of thing.
"So, Student Risha, what brings you to the night market?"
"Ahem. More than shopping, I came out to enjoy the night view. Though I also needed a change of mood."
"Change of mood?"
"Some absurd rumors have been circulating among a few students in my faction. As a member of the Claudia family, I put a stop to them at once, but dealing with fools who swallow such conspiracy theories whole was maddening enough that I stepped out for some fresh air and scenery."
Grandis Academy offered equality of opportunity, but it certainly didn't offer equality of status. It simply gave nobles and commoners the same chance to learn; stepping through the academy gates didn't make commoners equal to nobles.
That was why students from great houses like Risha Claudia often formed factions with other noble students whose families maintained close ties to their own.
'More to the point, she's calling members of her own faction fools and maddening. She's remarkably blunt.'
Maybe she thought we were practically in the same boat now that bribes had changed hands.
Connections and information—the more the better, as far as I was concerned, so this was a good thing.
Rumors, though?
"Might I ask what kind?"
"It's so wildly baseless. And I worry it would only confuse you, Finance Director."
"I'm off the clock. Right now, I'm not the Finance Director—I'm Adam Caines."
"Hah. Truly a ridiculous story—so please, don't laugh at me after you hear it."
What on earth was it?
With a deep sigh, Risha let her eyes openly convey her exasperation with her own faction.
"They say some organization is going to carry out a terror attack on Grandis Academy soon."
"Oh-ho."
"Isn't it laughable? A terror attack? On Grandis Academy? Even I find it absurd, and I'm a student—surely the Finance Director finds it even more so. I'm ashamed to even repeat it."
"Well... I suppose."
Strictly speaking, it wasn't a completely groundless rumor, but it was surfacing already? Was this some kind of foreshadowing?
'Should I give her a heads-up?'
Given Risha's character, she wouldn't take the help and then wash her hands of it, so it was worth considering.
I mulled it over for a moment, but then my eyes caught the magic spear slung across Risha's back as she let out a sigh.
──Be careful of Risha Claudia.
──Even if she herself is a good person, when she's holding a weapon, she can become something else.
Right.
It was a distant matter anyway. Better to wait for the right moment and give her a quiet warning then, rather than blurt it out now.
"Finance Director? Surely you aren't worrying about the nonsense my faction's fools have been spreading..."
"Come now, what would I have to worry about? The academy alone has five Guard Corps, and above all, the Chairwoman herself is planted right here. What lunatics could pull off a terror attack?"
"My thoughts exactly. Those idiots just enjoy sensational stories—please don't let it weigh on your mind."
"Understood. I need to head this way, so I'll take my leave."
"It was a pleasant conversation, Finance Director. Have a good evening."
"You as well, Student Risha. Get back safely."
I left the bustling night market behind and stepped into a dark side street. I'd come to the market on a whim, but I'd gained an unexpected piece of intelligence.
An academy terror attack—wasn't that a textbook cliché? It had actually happened in Dark Kingdom, too. I'd simply never given it much thought because it was something that occurred once the protagonist was a third-year.
Back then, if the financial management had failed, the academy would have had about a year of life left anyway. Terror attack or not, bankruptcy would've been nearly certain.
But if rumors were already circulating two years before the actual event...
'So the plants have been active since the first year.'
The terror group had inserted an operative into Grandis Academy. That "student" must have been working behind the scenes already.
I'd file it away for now. That was as far as my thoughts went. More importantly, I wanted to try out my fountain pen.
The moment I reached my dormitory, I entered my room, spread out a research paper, and reached for the pen—
"Hm."
—but stopped before I could use it.
A document was sitting on my desk.
I wasn't worried about an intruder. This was one of the emergency communication methods between me and the Chairwoman.
I don't know how she did it, but whenever I'd already left work and something genuinely urgent came up, the Chairwoman would leave the pertinent documents on my desk. She was 8th Rank, so she probably had some method or other.
It did raise the minor question of why she didn't simply come find me in person, but we were both busy—our schedules might not align—and in any case, to get proper work done I'd have to go to the office, so I'd inevitably end up meeting her anyway.
At any rate, I set down the still-unopened fountain pen set and read the document.
The contents were very simple.
A reply just arrived from Professor Kirke. Research begins next Monday, and we can meet as early as tomorrow.
Additionally, it seems something happened within the magic department. The research budget appears to be quite short.
And as always... I'm sorry.
The handwriting, which looked to be the Chairwoman's own, was slightly unsteady, as though carrying several layers of emotion.
The meeting with Professor Kirke—I'd requested it, and her reply had now arrived. The appointment was set for tomorrow, so this did qualify as an urgent message. I needed to prepare for the meeting anyway.
The internal affairs of the magic department and the research budget issue I'd have to look into gradually from here.
And the last line—a somewhat abrupt apology from the Chairwoman. Each heavily pressed character was written with sincerity.
I understood very well why the Chairwoman had included those words.
"I'd better get ready."
The person I was going to meet tomorrow was obviously Professor Kirke, but I had one more opponent to contend with.
A 'custom' that existed at Grandis Academy, treated as a given, especially among the magic department's professors.
Some called it history and tradition. Some called it entrenched privilege abuse and a vile practice. Some called it a benefit for the faculty.
It was something the Chairwoman herself, decades ago, could be said to have created.
And it was the real problem I had to solve.